A typical overhead garage door is constructed from a plurality of door sections, which are hinged together and supported from a track system with rollers attached to opposite ends of the door sections. The rollers generally allow the door to be moved from a vertically oriented closed position to a substantially horizontal open position. Electrically powered garage door openers are often used with the overhead garage door so that a driver may conveniently open and close the door from within a vehicle.
With regard to residential applications, an overhead garage door is generally either eight or sixteen feet wide. Typically, such a door includes four horizontally oriented door sections, each of which is about eight or sixteen feet wide and twenty-one inches high. For example, a single car residential garage may have an eight foot wide by seven foot high door. Likewise, a two car residential garage may have a single sixteen foot wide door by seven foot high door or two eight foot wide by seven foot high doors.
Some of the first doors made for garages were one piece barn doors that operated as large swinging or sliding doors. The nostalgic design of these doors is replicated in wood sectional carriage house garage doors. Indeed, wood sectional carriage house garage doors are particularly desirable for use with older homes to maintain the historic design of the home while gaining the convenience of the conventional overhead garage door. Carriage house garage doors are also desirable with newer homes for enhancing the overall appearance of the garage and consequently the house.
A sectional carriage house door functions like a typical overhead garage door in that it moves on a track and roller system to open and close the door. However, the appearance of the sectional carriage house door simulates the historic swing type doors used in early automobile shelters. The historic appearance of the sectional carriage house door is created by the application of various types of wood siding, wood trim boards, and/or wood raised panels applied over the exterior side of wood flush door sections, and wood or steel open frame door sections.
Unfortunately, a wood carriage house garage door is very costly relative to a conventional steel overhead garage door. This cost is due in part to labor costs incurred to perform the largely manual process of constructing the wood carriage house door. Furthermore, the material cost for the wood siding, wood trim boards, and/or wood raised panels is undesirably high. Thus, a homeowner may pay five to six times more for a wood carriage house door than for a conventional steel overhead door.
In addition to the costly initial investment, wood carriage house doors are costly to maintain. In particular, the wood is adversely affected by the elements. That is sun, rain, snow, varying temperatures, and so forth will degrade the finish of the wood and eventually cause the wood to warp, split, or rot. Consequently, the wood carriage house garage door should be re-sealed or re-painted every couple of years to maintain the aesthetic appearance and integrity of the wood carriage house garage door. This labor intensive and costly maintenance is highly undesirable to the typical homeowner.
In addition, insects, such as termites and carpenter ants, frequently attack the wood causing significant damage to the wood. Accordingly, the use of a wood carriage house garage door necessitates frequent inspections and treatment for insect damage. Again, this is a highly undesirable situation to the homeowner in terms of labor and cost.
Another problem with a wood carriage house garage door results from the weight of the wood siding, wood trim board, and/or wood raised panels, which typically adds one hundred to two hundred pounds to the overall weight of the sectional carriage house door. In particular, the wood or steel open frame door sections often lack the structural integrity or the strength to adequately support the added weight of the wood siding. Thus, the wood carriage house door has a limited life.
In addition, the wood carriage house door necessitates the use of reinforced hardware to support the weight of the wood. This leads to higher up front costs incurred by the homeowner for the appropriate hardware. If hardware is used that is insufficient for supporting the door, the door may repeatedly fall out of the door tracks, or the hardware components, such as the rollers, connection points, springs, or the tracks could fail causing property damage and/or injury.
In addition to the excessive cost and mechanical problems associated with a wood sectional carriage house door, the sectional carriage house door suffers from problems associated with aesthetic appearance. In particular, the use of four twenty-one inch horizontally oriented door sections to form the carriage house door results in three horizontal lines created at the section joints. These horizontal lines at the section joints detract from the appearance of the door, which is contrary to the objectives of maintaining the historic design and enhancing the overall appearance of the garage.
Thus, what is needed is an overhead garage door that is affordable, durable, low maintenance, impervious to weather and insects, and replicates the appearance of the historic swing type doors used in early automobile shelters.